Festival Predictions

2017 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Brian Shoaf’s Aardvark

Published on November 23, 2016

Shot in NYC exactly one year to date, for his directorial debut, actor, playwright and now filmmaker Brian Shoaf landed Zachary Quinto, Jenny Slate and Jon Hamm while teaming with Sundance behind the scene technicians in cinematographer Eric Lin (I Smile Back, Equity) and Heather McIntosh (Z for Zachariah) for a drama that’ll likely be compared to Lars and the Real Girl or The Beaver for it’s more subversive make-believe elements. With plenty of post production time to boot, Aardvark is more than ready for it’s unveiling — likely somewhere between Sundance and Tribeca.

Gist: This centers on a mentally ill man (Quinto) who, after suffering hallucinations, begins to see a therapist. He believes he has fallen in love, but isn’t sure if his new soulmate is real or a hallucination. At the same time, his new therapist (Slate) also finds love — with her new patient’s famous brother (Hamm).

Production Co./Producers: Neal Dodson (A Most Violent Year), Susan Leber (Landline) and Quinto.

Prediction: U.S. Dramatic Comp.

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available. Great Point Media (domestic/international)

[related]2017 Sundance Film Festival Predictions[/related]

Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).